The Hirsch index in manufacturing and Quality engineering.

The Hirsch index (h) is a recent bibliometric indicator for assessing the research output of scientists. Its most remarkable characteristics are immediate intuitive meaning, effective synthesis and easy calculation. With few modifications, the use of this indicator can be profitably extended to other fields beyond bibliometrics. The main novelty of the paper is to suggest some potential applications in manufacturing and Quality engineering, focussing the attention on the h capacity to aggregate and synthesize the most commonly used metrics in these areas. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]